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Friday, September 28, 2012

The last house in Anna

Laura pushes one cat or another down the sofa each night and
opens her homework. Last night Uncle
Tom, passing by, stopped and swiveled her book around. “Anna, Ohio!
I grew up there. I grew up right
here!” He pointed to the corner of a
picture of an aerial photo of the Honda plant outside Anna.

He did grow up there, the last house in town and right next
door to a huge farm. The farm continued
after the children left, right up to the deaths of both parents. The son wanted to keep on farming, the
daughter wanted her inheritance in cold hard cash and voila, the farm became a
housing development and a Honda plant.

We visited Anna for a reunion of Tom’s family some thirty
years ago. It was fall and haying time
and I wandered next door to help out at the farm. I climbed on a flat bed of bales of hay. One fellow handed a bale off to Tom, who
handed the bale off to me to put on the conveyor belt up to the hay mow. Two
childhood friends on the flat bed and another in the haymow, unloading bales from
the conveyor belt and stacking them.

You know what happened.
The two fellows handing off to me speeded up so gradually I didn’t
notice until I didn’t have time to wipe the sweat from my face. I thought they wanted to see if the girl
would cry “Uncle,” and of course I wouldn’t.
But they did get what they were waiting for—their friend stuck his head
out the window up there to say slow down you fools, but saw he was being paced
by a girl! Oh, the indignity of it. I let it go a couple more minutes, then did
cry “Uncle” so the poor fellow unloading and stacking wouldn’t have heat
stroke.

And now it’s a Honda plant.

I cannot fault the sister who was not seeking an investment
or pity the brother who could not obtain financing for his farm. It is what it is. That Honda plant was built in 1982, and now
in thirty years is in a fifth grade social studies book as an example of
transportation in America.

The plant provided decent jobs for the community. It gave young people a reason to put down
roots and stay where they grew up.
Although Tom wound up in the opposite corner of the state, the plant and
associated employment in the community kept his younger brothers close to home
and to their dad. Tom’s brother-in-law,
a retired federal prison system official, even settled down for a few years and
as city manager helped Anna manage its new found prosperity.

Tom’s childhood home, the last house in Anna, was as run
down as Tom’s dad a dozen or so years ago.
Dad knew it was time to find more suitable living quarters, and he went
to live with his daughter and the city manager of Anna. Dad knew a young couple in town, just
starting out, who often stopped by to talk to the old man and say, “If you ever
think of selling this house, we hope you will think of us.” Dad did, and the lovely old Craftsman home
has been restored for another family.

There is a beautiful picture of the front of that restored house,
the couple and their three stair step children tucked away in our house. If Tom finds it, I’ll change out that
Craftsman for this.

It is sad to see good farm land paved over. Too bad we can't have it both ways. Good for you to keep up with the guys on stacking the hay. heh heh. I'm so glad someone who appreciated the house bought it and cared for it.

How wonderful to see such a wonderful house so beautifully restored. Your description of bringing in the hay is wonderful -- until about 5 years ago our neighbour and farmer in France did it much the same way -- with his whole family turned out! My husband was so enthralled on year he climbed over the fence and joined in -- I took pictures and videos!

The delicate balance of industry moving into neighborhoods is tough. I recently read about Three Rivers Gorge Dam in China that destroyed countless villages and many cities. That is something serious there. They had absolutely no say in the matter at all. Craftsman style houses are one of my favorite styles of houses. But I am over old houses. Our old house has nearly killed me. hugs, olive